


Curiosity Kills Slowly

by forgetmenotjimmy



Series: Brought Back [1]
Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Dehumanization, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Kidnapping, Medical Experimentation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-11
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-11-12 15:14:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11164542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forgetmenotjimmy/pseuds/forgetmenotjimmy
Summary: "Unfortunately, the human still refused to cooperate, even after being offered rewards for compliance or punishment for non-compliance. Its stubborn refusal was frustrating but not surprising given the difficulty they had faced capturing it. Even weakened and surrounded by guards it had put up a fierce fight, in fact it still fought them every day. There was no chance of it escaping or overpowering anyone, but still it tried relentlessly."





	Curiosity Kills Slowly

**Author's Note:**

> So I started watching 'Star Trek: Enterprise' on Netflix last month and promptly fell in love with it, with Trip having the dubious honour of being my favourite character.
> 
> Warning: non-graphic descriptions of medical experimentation, use of mild bad language and general unpleasantness. Un-beta'd.
> 
> If you think any warnings are missing or have any other feedback, let me know!  
> :)

“Interesting, it seems the temperature influences its metabolism.” Movement accompanied the voice ringing slightly in the cold room. Another figure joined the speaker and peered down at the body on the table. Shivering, the creature being examined wasn’t quite conscious, still recovering from the sedative used to move it from the cell to the laboratory. 

“Hmmm, its temperature regulation mechanisms don’t seem to be very fine-tuned. Do we have data on the climate of its home planet?”

“I think we have something that says it varies greatly. That’s why I was surprised at these meagre mechanisms. It has sweat glands and widening of the blood vessels to reduce body temperature but it’s only effective for short periods. The shivering mechanism and hormone control for increasing body temperature are not much better. In real terms it cannot survive for long periods in extremes on either side of the scale.” For a minute they stared down at the subject, the jaw was now trembling, wrists and ankles clacking slightly in the restraints as minute shivers wracked the whole body. The creature’s eyes roamed, unfocused, at the ceiling, unable to move its head much after they had attached the neck restraint. One of the technicians was still nursing a bruised face a few days after the incident in which subject had reared up suddenly and struck the technician with its forehead.

The other scientists had been intrigued by this unexpected action, theorising that it was a practiced offensive technique for the species due to the thicker and more durable skull covering the upper head as opposed to the weaker bone of the nose. On another human, the move could have severely damaged the cartilage. Indeed, far from a desperate or random act, the attack had been calculated as the subject had managed to free one of its wrists from the restraints. Whilst the technician had been reeling in surprise and pain, it had levered itself up, fumbling in the technician’s uniform for the restraint controls. Fortunately for the scientists, they did not share this weakness in their facial structure and the technician had quickly recovered and sedated the flailing creature.

Humans were indeed proving to be fascinating. In their subsequent investigation of the incident, they discovered that it had deliberately dislocated its thumb joint to slip its hand through the restraint. Curious, they had realigned the joint and then dislocated it again, theorising that it while numerous repeats would ultimately damage the joint and surrounding tissue, it was a neat trick and very useful in such situations. Studying the rest of the body, they identified other parts which would be deliberately manipulated in the same way and had set the human up in a few different restraints to test its attempts to escape them. Unfortunately, the human had refused to participate, even after being offered rewards for compliance or punishment for non-compliance. Its stubborn refusal was frustrating but not surprising given the difficulty they had faced capturing it. Even weakened and surrounded by guards it had put up a fierce fight, in fact it still fought them every day. There was no chance of it escaping or overpowering anyone, but still it tried relentlessly. Though disappointed by the lack of results for this avenue of experimentation, the scientists had been reluctant to accidentally damage the specimen, so they had put those tests on hold. Anyway, there was much more they could learn through other experiments.

Examining the raised hair on the subject’s skin, the scientists ignored the meaningless sounds now slurring out of its mouth. They had grown accustomed to ignoring the human speaking in a constant and quiet stream. Even after it had given up trying to communicate with them and gain their attention through angry shouting, the human still mumbled things to itself whenever it was conscious. The scientists only turned on the translation device when they wanted the human to do something, although they had never managed to convince it to do anything without the electro-shock device. After taking a few more notes, the scientists raised the temperature to normal levels and moved on to the next experiment.

-

The sound of laboured breathing was just discernible under the pounding of feet and beeping of the machines. Bored, one of the technicians increased the speed of the running device and the subject grunted as it elongated its strides to keep up. The cord connecting the human’s neck collar to the machine tightening before it regained its rhythm. One of the hands twitched upwards, as if to touch the cord, but as the technician paused to watch it fell again, returning to the steady swinging action the human adopted whilst running at this speed. It had finally learned not to attempt to tamper with the restraints or attempt escape. The electro-shock punishments probably had something to do with that. Though it hadn't stopped the sullen glances and muttered curses.

“Is it done yet?” The technician on shift looked up at the new figure entering the room.

“Almost, be patient. We have to keep it functioning at natural levels, look at the size of its musculature, those would waste away if it didn’t exercise daily.” The scientist frowned.

“You don’t have to lecture me on protocol. I just want to get started on today’s tests before the boss comes down for another report.” It impatiently watched the subject running in place. They had already studied it whilst in motion, cataloguing the different stances and coordination of limbs in the different speed configurations. Humans seemed to have an average top speed and physical stamina among humanoids, at least this one did. They had done well to acquire such a healthy specimen. It had been broken in a few places when it had been brought in. But after they'd observed the natural healing processes of the species, they had fixed the remaining damage and it was otherwise very robust. The scientist nodded to the guard as the technician gradually lowered the speed on device. Stepping back, the scientist observed warily as the subject finally came to a stop, panting and wiping its forehead. Though it had not acted violently in a while, the scientist could still remember how fast it could move. The guard waited a few moments for the human to recover before moving in, motioning with the wrist restraints he now held. Glaring, the subject complied, placing both hands behind it and not resisting as they were bound. The technician released the neck cord and the guard escorted the subject to the laboratory.

-

“Well, better decrease the dose, just to be sure. The boss did stress no permanent damage.” The other scientist frowned as it adjusted the dosage and injecting the chemical into a vein in the forearm.

“I don’t agree with this idea to sell it on, I don’t believe we will ever run out of things to learn about its species.”

“Well, we know he has little interest in our actual work, only in how much it will fetch on the market. And really, is there anyone other than scientists who would want to know much about the biology of this species? They’re not at war with anyone else and they don’t produce particularly valuable by-products, at least not in large enough quantities to farm profitably. No matter how interesting they are to us, no one would pay much for the data-” he cut himself off as the subject began to react. Red marks began to spread over the top layer of skin and it shifted in the restraints, grunting. The scientists murmured observations to each other as they took notes and scans.

“Ah yes, you can see these circular cells coming from the bones, they’re interacting with the toxin. It seems like some sort of secretions are being released, this could be causing the inflammation.” The subject was growing more agitated, straining its limbs and panting heavily. The scientists catalogued the response and went on discussing the results.

“Is it inflammation? Ah yes, it’s heating up. Hmmm, how long do we predict this inflammation of the skin will last? We haven’t seen that before, have we?”

“That’s correct, this is a new reaction we are cataloguing. Keep a close eye on it, have you-” Suddenly the human twisted violently, shouting as it pulled both the right wrist and ankle at once, shifting the table slightly from the strength of the motion. The scientists paused in their work, taken aback, before one beckoned in the guard and the other reached for the anaesthetic.

“Wait! It might interfere with the test! We don’t know how that will react with the circular cells or their secretions.” The human was now yelling loudly something in its language, shaking the table as it rocked, trying to coordinate its limbs and half-succeeding. Gritting his teeth, one scientist reached for the translation device and tried to order the subject to be still over the screaming. It didn’t listen, yelling for them to stop the pain, to let it go and cursing them in one long breath. The guard held down both of its legs which caused it to scream louder. The scientist with the translator almost turned to make a note that physical pain was among the reactions, before shaking himself and trying to ask the creature if the anaesthetic would interfere with the defence mechanism. At this, his colleague finally lost his temper.

“For goodness sake, don’t ask it! Like it would know!”

The guard was now leaning on the human’s lower half as the upper half still squirmed, he looked at the scientists and demanded breathily.

“How long do I have to do this for?”

“Shut it, you! You'll hold it as long as it takes!”

“It’s going exhaust itself eventually. Right?” Clear liquid began to be secreted from the human’s eyes as it continued to yell, the words becoming less clear and the voice becoming more strained. Whilst it was showing signs of tiring, it still fought against the restraints and the guard. Losing patience, the scientist holding the anaesthesia glanced at his colleague before injecting it forcefully into the sweaty neck. After a few more seconds filled with enraged swearing and struggling, the subject finally calmed, mumbling one last curse before succumbing to unconsciousness.

-

The technician started at the beeping noise. He had been reading a novel, resigned to spending a long and boring night shift monitoring the sleep experiment. The scientists, those superior know-it-alls, had set up the experiment and then left for the night, leaving the technician to monitor and note down any results. The technician had grumbled, as if they couldn’t have connected more machines to the subject to record anything. This was just another example of their arrogance and false sense of importance. Sleepily, the technician looked over to the equipment and realised that the brainwaves had changed. The machine had already catalogued different stages of the human’s sleep cycle which repeated continuously whilst it remained asleep. But now something was different: the speed of the brainwaves had increased but the depth had not altered. It was a new pattern. Putting down his book, the technician moved closer and noticed that the facial muscles were twitching minutely at random intervals. He made notes as the limbs began shifting as well. Then the human began speak, at first indistinct mumbling but then louder, more desperate cries. Curious despite himself, the technician turned on the translation device.

“Cap’n! Over here!” The technician noted down the words, wondering what it was dreaming about. The subject’s breathing had also sped up, its limbs still twitching as it carried on struggling and crying out. “Please! No…don’t leave…please…” As suddenly as it had begun, it stopped moving, its limbs relaxing as some fluid escaped from underneath one of the eyelids. Quickly the technician collected a sample. Keeping one eye on the still subject in case it did something else, he ran it through the processing machine and corroborated it with the scientist’s notes. Interesting…

At seemingly random intervals, the scientists had discovered the human leaking from the eye ducts, a salty fluid with so far no discernible purpose. It had been discharged when the scientists had been studying and performing tests on the eyes, so they had assumed it was a natural defence mechanism, cleaning any irritants from the sensitive area. But they had also recorded the same discharge on other occasions, including during the incident with the toxin and inflammatory reaction. This new instance just added to the mystery of its full biological purposes. Maybe when they had a bigger sample size, they would be able to discover it. Eventually the brainwaves levelled out and as the human returned to normal sleep patterns, the technician returned to his book.

-

The light on the scanner changed from red to green as the scan completed and the bio bed slide from out of the chamber. The two scientists stood in front of the monitor, reading over the scan report. After a moment, one turned to the other to resume their conversation.

“We shouldn’t have left the Research Centre-”

“Not that again! This job isn’t so bad, sure there’s no recognition, but think about all we’ve discovered.” The disgruntled scientist conceded that point with a gesture whilst still reading through the results. His colleague jotted down some notes before continuing. “There’s never any shortage of interesting projects. Where else would you have been able to study this species?” He indicated to the subject still strapped to the bio bed. “No one’s ever heard of this one before us! They must be very far from their own system, we were lucky their starship took the bait and this one was separated from the rest of the landing party.” Seeing his colleague nodding absently in agreement, the scientist looked down at the subject contemplatively.

“How did that happen I wonder… Its injuries were relatively minor and there doesn’t seem to be any inherent physical weakness in it. But it had been found away from the others.” The human’s eyes had finally re-focused, indicating that the latest muscle-relaxant had worn off, and it fixed the scientist with a furious glare, its face contorting into a snarl.

“Damn you.” The words were slightly slurred and its voice was still raspy from dehydration – they were still figuring out the correct amount of fluids and nutrients to keep it functioning naturally. The scientist standing over the human stared. That was a curse in the scientist’s own language. It hadn’t been a perfect pronunciation, but it was unmistakeable. He glanced over to the translation device but it was turned off. The human had learnt it. From where?

“Have you been talking to it?” His colleague looked at him strangely and shook his head before considering.

“Must have been one of the technicians, probably said it within its hearing. Bet it was the new one, he’s clumsy and unprofessional.” The first scientist looked back down at the subject, whose glare intensified as it slowly and deliberately repeated the curse and then the scientist’s name. Now slightly uneasy, the scientist frowned and grabbed his notes, turning his back on the table. He joined his colleague by the scanner but imagined he could feel the subject’s piercing gaze on him.

-

The needle piercing the skin caused a barely perceptible flinch across the subject’s face. Otherwise it did not react, not even to try to speak. Try, because it was currently gagged. The function of the gag was nominally to measure how air was regulated through the nasal passages. But in truth the scientists had gotten tired of the creature parroting their language. At first when it had started repeating random words back to them it had mostly been an interesting, if a little disquieting, development. The guards had found it very amusing and some of the bolder ones had even tried surreptitiously to teach it more rude words; anything to lighten up an admittedly boring job. But then the boss had found out and swiftly put a stop to it. Unless anyone was willing to pay for it to be their pet, it was his property and everyone should be focusing on milking it for any lucrative information or else they could look for employ elsewhere.

In any case, the scientists now avoided looking the human in the eyes. The fierce intelligence and hatred there, coupled with its growing understanding of their language, had begun to unsettle them despite themselves. To their relief, a few days with the gag in place seemed to have had a calming effect on it. It had quickly stopped trying to speak and its hateful stare had started to become distant, as if its mind was disengaging. The scientists had theorised that perhaps humans needed constant communication to function normally and were planning some tests to build evidence for their idea.

They’d almost finished analysing the current data when door slid open and another figure walked in.

“Gentlemen, how are the tests progressing? Learn anything of value?”

“Hello sir, here are the latest results.” The superior glanced over the data dismissively before approaching the table and looking down at the human. The human was startled out of its quasi-meditative state and glared back silently. In the background the two scientists exchanged a glance but didn’t speak. The boss stared for a few more moments before extracting something from his pocket. He held it in front of the human’s face and recognition flickered in those sharp eyes. The boss reached down and removed the gag, turning on the translation device and stating simply, with a hint of a mean grin.

“We detected your ship entering the system.” The human tensed even more, restraints clinking as it shifted. “It seems that your people managed to follow the trail we laid. About time, we were suspecting that we’d been too subtle.” The subject jerked in the restraints at this, anger etched in its facial expression and taught in its limbs. But it did not speak. “It will be in range of your little device soon and I would like to meet more of your delightful species…” The choice was clear: contact its ship in hope of rescue whilst risk exposing the rest of the crew to the boss’ financial interests, or refuse to contact the ship and remain here indefinitely. One of the scientists leaned in, studying the new facial expressions with interest. At first the glower deepened, then the facial muscles smoothed into a stiff but neutral position. The eyes unfocused, staring past the boss’s face. The scientist was unable to discern if this was due to the human performing calculations or merely mentally disconnecting from the situation. Finally, after a lengthy pause, the human turned its head away in a clear answer. Snorting, the boss grabbed its chin and forced the head back around, leaning in to laugh.

“I’ll get them either way, boy. They can either surrender peacefully and be sold off whole, or I can destroy the ship and auction off their parts.” He leaned in menacingly. “You know I can do it, I have the technology. They won’t see me coming until it’s too late. Just like how we took you.” He patted the captive’s check in a parody of affection. “Your choice.” The human narrowed its eyes, words suddenly and desperately exploding out of its mouth.

“Burn in Hell!” Looking bored, the boss raised an eyebrow and drawled.

“Is that a no?” A moment of tense silence passed before the human turned its head away again, fists clenched and limbs trembling. The boss sighed and stepped back. “Fine, have it your way.” He pocketed the communication device, turning to the scientists. "You have another day then I want it cleaned up for the show." He glanced down again, assessing coldly. "After that, start the conditioning, see if we can't make a sellable slave out of it." Then he nodded to the guard and left. The scientist went back to their work, frustrated by the time limit but animated by the thought that they might soon have more test subjects. They started discussing how they would persuade the boss to retain as many of the humans as possible for their experiments and which experiments they would prioritise. Before long, it was time to finish for the day. One of the scientists went to beckon in the guard as the other went to prep the subject for relocation. Glancing down at its face, the scientist noted the eye ducts had leaked again. He noted it down absently before helping the guard take the subject back to its cell.

**Author's Note:**

> In my head the crew rescue Trip, destroy the 'research' facility and fly off into the sunset for some long overdue comfort, but I left the ending open for you to interpret how you want.


End file.
